The present invention generally relates to a copying apparatus and more particularly, to a copying machine provided with a reserve function, for automatically copying reserved originals set on an original tray.
A conventional copying machine with a reserve function allows no interruptions of the copying process by the copying of other originals once the copying of reserved originals has started, unless copying of the reserved originals is completed. For this reason, once copying of the reserved originals has started, a user walking up to a copying machine with new originals, other than the reserved ones, has to wait until the copying of reserved orginals is completed. This causes time loss, an inconvenience when the number of copies is too large, and machine inefficiency, when urgent copies, other than those that are reserved, can not be made.
Also, the conventional copying machine with a reserve function has a feature such that when a user is successively making copies of un-reserved and reserved originals, reserved original copying operation starts when a predetermined time elapses after un-reserved original copying is completed.
Under the above condition, if the copying operation for the un-reserved originals is carried out one-by-one, through the steps of opening a cover, setting the original on a platform, closing the cover and depressing the copy button, there may be a case when the user takes a long time between the steps which is longer than the allotted predetermined time. If this happens, the reserved original copying operation starts, resulting in a drawback whereby the user may be confused because it will be difficult to distinguish between the un-reserved copy and the reserved copy since reserved copying starts in the middle of the process.